Thursday, November 5, 2015

Changing

'Have you been to the hospital for diabetes since your last appointment?'

'Yes'

'Were you admitted?'

'No.'

'Have you had your flu shot'

'No, not yet.'

'When was your last dilated eye exam?'

Joe's eyes darted to me. I answered.

A couple of days ago, we visited the Endocrinologist. Joe's A1C was 7.1. The usual things were discussed and assessed. The unusual part of the visit was Joe was now an integral participant in the visit.

More questions were directed to Joe, by the endocrinologist.

'How's the carbohydrate counting, the blood sugar checking, and the bolusing going?'

'I'm asking you these things, not because you are going to get in trouble, but because these are the things you are in control of ...I don't want to recommend changes to your settings if you are missing boluses or if your carb counting is off.'

Joe responded, confirming he was good with the carb counting. He is. Joe responded, confirming he checks his blood sugar regularly. He does. Joe responded, admitting he forgets to bolus for afternoon snacks. He has a few times over the past few months.

Overall, Joe is doing well. The basal rates need adjusting. Apparently I've kept him on little boy settings and need to boost them up to more "teenager-y" settings.

He's changed so much.

He's grown over 3 inches in the last several months.

His toes frequently grow out the front of his sneakers.

His face has thinned.

His legs have thickened.

His total daily insulin dose is now over 40 units; it used to be in the low teens.

As we drove away from the hospital, Joe asked if he could start to help me with adjusting his pump settings. 'I need to start being a part of that Mom... someday I'll need to do it on my own.'

8 comments:

Yes and it will only keep changing. Zach is 17 now and will be 18 in April. I cant believe that legally I will not have a say in his medical treatments. I have to just hope that we have taught him well and be there to assit if needed.

It's so good to see you in the blogosphere again. I'VE MISSED YOU! but seriously, it's like you stopped blogging and Joe grew up and now he's practically a MAN! things are changing, luckily I never had to experience puberty and growing up with D. I can't even imagine....

Awesome post my friend. Great encouragement and modeling to the rest of us. E's always been part of her visits b/c she was so much older than Joe when diagnosed, but still there's always "increasing transfer" of the responsibility. She hardly ever looks to me for answers. She occasionally looks to me to prompt something she's forgotten but which is "tickling" her brain, or she'll be done answering and I'll prompt her to add "what about the night when we were ____...." and she'll go "oh yeah" etc. It's quite the responsibility - but then, it is their condition and they do have to be ready to do it "all" when we're not around, whether a particular day or when they go off without us.

E's a regular babysitter now, and we're not at home wondering how she's doing. She's gone away without us for days and even a week now. Always with a support system, but she's been the one initiating, managing, and advocating.

As for the upcoming "18" (not for roughly a year yet, but it's starting to seem like tomorrow), the key we've come to understand is that she can (and plans to) legally allow us access to her records so that we can advocate for her, help her, pick up her prescriptions, etc, esp. in an emergency or when she goes off to college and needs something. I have heard our clinic has a great transitioning program and they have already brought it up. We even know who her endo will be and he's a family acquaintance (we've chatted it up at baseball games - woohoo!). And she likes that - it'll be an easier transition for her for that I think. I also think we're a mere 3 visits away from initiating that process.

And you know you're a mom or kid w/diabetes when several of your college visit questions have to do with their health center... (which I never thought twice about personally, and only visited a handful of times in my four years there). She wants to know how that works, where it is, what services they offer... and when you "pop in" for a visit on your campus tour what your impression is of their staff and welcoming nature actually matters more than how many majors you can choose from.